Melody Kilbank

If it’s been a while since you last moved, you might be wondering how much you’ll need to spend on your next home. That’s an important question to answer, even if you’re just at the “thinking about it” stage and haven’t decided whether or not you’ll look for a new property.

After all, knowing your budget might influence your decision.

How should you determine your budget?

The first step is to calculate the maximum you can spend. This involves adding the money you’ll get from the sale of your current property after repaying your outstanding mortgage, to any other funds you have available to invest plus the maximum amount of mortgage you qualify to receive.

Of course, just because you may qualify for a large mortgage doesn’t mean you want those bigger payments. So, the second step is to think about your needs. What features are a must in your next home? For example, you might want four bedrooms and anything less would be a deal-breaker.

Make a “must-have list”. That list can be used to find a baseline of properties on the market — and then find their average asking price. This will give you an idea of what it would cost to find a home that meets your must-have list.

The third step is to go beyond needs and consider the features you want. These might not be deal-breakers, but you’d sure love to have them in your next home. They could be a large deck, a location in a desirable neighbourhood, a big country kitchen, etc.

Ask yourself how much you would be willing to pay for those desirable features. $20,000? $50,000?

Once you’ve gone through these steps, you’ll have the information you need to match your needs and wants to what’s available on the market — and you’ll know how much you might expect to pay for your next home.

If you’re thinking of selling or buying, give me a call.

August City of Edmonton only stats are providing some hope to home owners! Equity is on the rise.

If like me you have been seeing the value of your residential real estate decline over this past year, I have some good news. Stats in all categories are up year over year and month over month. There is one exception, which I’ll mention in a minute.

Year over year numbers for all products are up, all residential by .6%, single family by 2.7% and duplex rowhouse by 6.6%. Unfortunately for condo owners prices are down 6.4%.

Month over month the market has improved, all products are up 1.9%, single family up 2.5%, condos up 5.3% and duplex/rowhouse 5.8%

Single family and duplex/rowhouses are in a balanced position, while condos and all products averaged are still favoring buyers.

Whether this uptick in the market is a seasonal increase or if it is the turning of better things to come, only time will tell.

The Federal government launched a new first time home buyer initiative this past week. If you or someone you know is considering a first purchase, have them call me for details.